This card alone swayed me from being a 100% Izzet League Fanatic, to sneaking out to the Rakdos pleasure houses when Niv isn't looking. Amazing art and not to shabby card either when it's used properly.
Lotsofpoopy
★☆☆☆☆ (1.1/5.0)(8 votes)
Wow, this guy can get big and he will trample hard. I am a pro and I predict that his horror will see a lot of play.
Goatllama
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(5 votes)
Rakdos had an affair with a witch? Interesting....... this card is obviously their baby, and boy does it show.
steev
★★★★☆ (4.2/5.0)(3 votes)
This is brutal and I need four. In red/black aggro this guy can come down at 8/8+ easily, which is exactly the sort of staying power that deck often needs to survive in multiplayer (especially if you're running lots of burn and can't-block creatures). Plus, if you have Rakdos, Lord of Riots, he's probably a 2-drop. The card's better every time I look at it.
LordRandomness
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(2 votes)
Excellent in black aggro. I can see myself running it alongside Treacherous Pit-Dweller, threatening a 4/4 trample turn 3 if there's nothing to stop it, or larger later on. Cryptborn Horror's biggest issue is vulnerability to Vapor Snag: re-casting might be a tricky prospect later in the game.
Coralus
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(2 votes)
Seems like it would work nicely with a Vexing Devil. Turn 4: start with Vexing devil. They take four, to prevent it? Too bad. You took 4, and still have to deal with a 4/4, that tramples. Next turn, swing, and Fling, and play a second one, no?
jkt3
★★★☆☆ (3.5/5.0)(2 votes)
This is Bloodthirst X just like Thromok was Devour X. I like it a lot.
RAV0004
★★★☆☆ (3.8/5.0)(2 votes)
Although I'm not a fan of bloodthirst switching from Gruul to Rakdos (even if it makes sense it's being mean to the guild identities of chaotic savagery vs chaotic entertainment), I do like this card alot. For those bemoaning the cmc:
What? You want it MORE expensive? When you cast it, it better be along the lines of 6, 7, or 8 power. Anything less is a waste of a card. If you can't do that much damage by turn three? CAST IT TURN FIVE. Look, the cheaper the spells you cast late game, the better it's going to be for you. "Oh look I guess I do have the 3 for that mana leak or spell pierce". If it cost 2 that would be GREAT. Of course you'd never cast it turn 2, but it's still an amazing card.
Vandarringa
★★★☆☆ (3.8/5.0)(2 votes)
I like a lot of the Rakdos cards in the set, but this is not one of them. If you're planning on this as your turn three threat, you'll be lucky to have a 3/3 trampler. If you're doing 8 damage on turn three, then you don't need this card, unless you want to win more. I'm not even sure this would be competitive if it only cost 2 mana. Definitely not a replacement for Stormblood Berserker, and certainly not as good as Hellhole Flailer. Maybe better in multiplayer. Glad it's a rare.
Got one of these at prerelease. Didn't use it there because I played strict Golgari, but looks like it has a lot of great aggro potential. Plus, I love cards with interesting effects instead of Baneslayer Angel-like cards where it's just a bunch of keywords on a good body and cheap cost. In my opinion, those are boring and never much fun to play with.
@Ryjhan- That wouldn't work because Worldfire just sets each player's life to 1; it doesn't deal damage or cause players to lose life. It's like the difference between erasing a 20 and writing in a 1 instead of calculating 20 - 19. So in this case, your Horror would come back and promptly go into the graveyard, unless you dealt any actual damage that turn.
Pinto331
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I'm skeptical of this in standard. Odds are dropping it turn 3 will be inefficient in all but the most absurdly aggressive decks, and those decks are the same kind that will be very susceptible to a Terminus or Supreme Verdict. If a control deck manages to stabilize against you this becomes useless.
EDH is where this will get played. Black and Red certainly don't hurt for ways to dish out damage to opponents. In a Jund deck with Jarad? Hoo-boy. That's gonna blow up a table or two.
hardtimesforNik
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Nice addition to stuffy doll decks with vexing devilish, treacherous pit dweller, blasphemous act, etc.
Radagast
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Best in Commander, but still begging to be used in some silly combo somewhere.
Ragamander
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(2 votes)
Hey there. War Elemental called. He says he wants to party.
Without many free or low-cost sources of massive direct damage, Cryptborn Horror isn't really going to thrive in Standard. Neither Thunderous Wrath nor creature combat damage seem reliable enough (though I am a bit tempted to try chaining Flings together to get the damage through).
Alternately, if you can manage to stall for a huge amount of time: Havoc Festival. Although if you've just drained half of your opponent's life, you should probably just burn them to death.
Rather, I see him finding a home in more casual formats alongside Seal of Fire and Fireblast. Alternately, EDH, where there's enough mana to, say, Exsanguinate four opponents for five each and then cast a 20/20 trampling Horror.
@Wurmcaller: Ryjhan's combo actually works; Worldfire will cause massive life loss, causing Cryptborn Horror to be enormous. 118.5. If an effect sets a player‘s life total to a specific number, the player gains or loses the necessary amount of life to end up with the new total. (Of course, you only need to deal one damage after Worldfire, so you might as well Oblivion Ring a Rakdos Shred-Freak...or just have a Thragtusk on the board. It's mostly impossible to stop a 3/3 with one card and no mana.)
Vexing Devil, obviously. Stab Wound works pretty nicely with it as well. Stab wound turn 3, Vexing Devil turn 4, then you have at worst 6/6 trampler. If you can manage to hit them with a creature first, even better.
alphagprime
★★☆☆☆ (2.8/5.0)(2 votes)
I really want this card to be good. I love the concept of it. In all honesty though I think I like it better in like mono-red casual or something but still. I think if you are going to try and make a card like this work legitimately in standard you would have to include cards like Goblin Arsonist, Vexing Devil, Chaos Festival, Thunderous Wrath, Bump in the Night, Guttersnipe, and/or Blood Artist. All of those cards have ways of getting through decent damage assuming they don't get countered and most of them are usually fairly cheap in mana cost. Also could work with Curse of Bloodletting or Curse of Stalked Prey.
Noohj
★★☆☆☆ (2.3/5.0)(5 votes)
This isn't a rakdos card. This is a GOLGORI CARD!!!
Despite the low mana cost, this card is really only any good when you can deal large amounts of damage to your opponent thus makes it a late game card.
Twylyght
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
This is fun using any number of ways to flash it out after the opponent who goes just before you swings big at another player in a big EDH game.
MithosFall
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I might be able to have some fun with this plus Orzhov's new ability.
Ferlord
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
This is a very hard card to play, in both Limited or Standard. In Limited, you're going to have to hold onto some burn spells or until you have a decent army. Since you're usually limiting your choice of what you can use (GET IT?! LIMITED?! HA!), that's easier said than done. Not only that, but you might rather use that burn spell on Are you going to wait until you've got 9 lands to play your Explosive Impact, not considering how many creatures they got by then? I don't think so.
Not only that, but even IF you can get it to a high number, Detain and removal isn't uncommon.
In Standard, singular removal is very common, and big bodies aren't usually a good thing to have.
In EDH, you can deal a lot of damage (if you have Pestilence/Pyrohemia out, or something similar), but again, one big baddie with trample isn't hard to deal with. If it had Hexproof (like Dungrove Elder), that might be more dangerous.
Osprey_93
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
The other day I was playing old school zombies with this card side boarded in since there were 7 players including myself.
I had four zombies, another guy had two, I tapped shepherd of rot dealing 6 life loss to the whole table then playing this guy as a 36/36 trample turn 5, with a second in hand that never hit the table.
Moral of this story? I got teamed.
JaxsonBateman
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
@Osprey - he would've been 42/42 as Shepherd deals damage to you too. And you probably got teamed when, y'know, you caused a 42 point swing in a single turn. Cryptborn just made it much more obvious.
In any case... decent. Has a lot more potential in MP if you can somehow put it out on an opponent's turn, as it then requires no extra mana or cards from you (as long as other players are beating on each other). In a typical deck though, to get it at curve or above it's usually going to require more mana, more cards, or both. I saw the comment about Heartless Hidetsugu, and that illustrates the point - one of the easier synergies to set up, yet requires you to first play a 5 mana creature in order to get value out of your 3 mana creature.
Really, the best idea is to put it in a fast aggro deck. Turn 1 Stormkirk Noble, turn 2 Rakdos Cackler x 2, turn 3 6/6 trampler for 3. After having already dealt 6 damage, on turn 4 you're looking at 13 and one very unhealthy looking opponent. Of course, removal stops this plan, but even if only 2 of the cretins get through you're looking at an above curve turn 3 play.
However, most players are just going to go the path of reliability and play a 3 drop that's always decent.
Put it in my Golgari deck during the prerelease. It was usually about a 4/4. If it hits play any bigger than that, you're probably already winning.
Thingummy
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
"@Ryjhan- That wouldn't work because Worldfire just sets each player's life to 1; it doesn't deal damage or cause players to lose life. It's like the difference between erasing a 20 and writing in a 1 instead of calculating 20 - 19. So in this case, your Horror would come back and promptly go into the graveyard, unless you dealt any actual damage that turn."
Worldfire's ruling says the following:
"If your life total is greater than 1 when Worldfire resolves, the change in life total will count as life loss. Other effects that interact with life loss will interact with this effect accordingly."
Leuitikos
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
For everyone saying this is or Rakdos, both of you are wrong this a Gruul creature with Bloodthirst X, where X is the amount of life lost by players this turn.
Comments (35)
The card's better every time I look at it.
What? You want it MORE expensive? When you cast it, it better be along the lines of 6, 7, or 8 power. Anything less is a waste of a card. If you can't do that much damage by turn three? CAST IT TURN FIVE. Look, the cheaper the spells you cast late game, the better it's going to be for you. "Oh look I guess I do have the 3 for that mana leak or spell pierce". If it cost 2 that would be GREAT. Of course you'd never cast it turn 2, but it's still an amazing card.
@Ryjhan- That wouldn't work because Worldfire just sets each player's life to 1; it doesn't deal damage or cause players to lose life. It's like the difference between erasing a 20 and writing in a 1 instead of calculating 20 - 19. So in this case, your Horror would come back and promptly go into the graveyard, unless you dealt any actual damage that turn.
EDH is where this will get played. Black and Red certainly don't hurt for ways to dish out damage to opponents. In a Jund deck with Jarad? Hoo-boy. That's gonna blow up a table or two.
Without many free or low-cost sources of massive direct damage, Cryptborn Horror isn't really going to thrive in Standard. Neither Thunderous Wrath nor creature combat damage seem reliable enough (though I am a bit tempted to try chaining Flings together to get the damage through).
Alternately, if you can manage to stall for a huge amount of time: Havoc Festival. Although if you've just drained half of your opponent's life, you should probably just burn them to death.
Rather, I see him finding a home in more casual formats alongside Seal of Fire and Fireblast. Alternately, EDH, where there's enough mana to, say, Exsanguinate four opponents for five each and then cast a 20/20 trampling Horror.
@Wurmcaller: Ryjhan's combo actually works; Worldfire will cause massive life loss, causing Cryptborn Horror to be enormous.
118.5. If an effect sets a player‘s life total to a specific number, the player gains or loses the necessary
amount of life to end up with the new total.
(Of course, you only need to deal one damage after Worldfire, so you might as well Oblivion Ring a Rakdos Shred-Freak...or just have a Thragtusk on the board. It's mostly impossible to stop a 3/3 with one card and no mana.)
Corpsejack Menace. Enough said.
In Limited, you're going to have to hold onto some burn spells or until you have a decent army. Since you're usually limiting your choice of what you can use (GET IT?! LIMITED?! HA!), that's easier said than done. Not only that, but you might rather use that burn spell on Are you going to wait until you've got 9 lands to play your Explosive Impact, not considering how many creatures they got by then? I don't think so.
Not only that, but even IF you can get it to a high number, Detain and removal isn't uncommon.
In Standard, singular removal is very common, and big bodies aren't usually a good thing to have.
In EDH, you can deal a lot of damage (if you have Pestilence/Pyrohemia out, or something similar), but again, one big baddie with trample isn't hard to deal with. If it had Hexproof (like Dungrove Elder), that might be more dangerous.
I had four zombies, another guy had two, I tapped shepherd of rot dealing 6 life loss to the whole table then playing this guy as a 36/36 trample turn 5, with a second in hand that never hit the table.
Moral of this story? I got teamed.
In any case... decent. Has a lot more potential in MP if you can somehow put it out on an opponent's turn, as it then requires no extra mana or cards from you (as long as other players are beating on each other). In a typical deck though, to get it at curve or above it's usually going to require more mana, more cards, or both. I saw the comment about Heartless Hidetsugu, and that illustrates the point - one of the easier synergies to set up, yet requires you to first play a 5 mana creature in order to get value out of your 3 mana creature.
Really, the best idea is to put it in a fast aggro deck. Turn 1 Stormkirk Noble, turn 2 Rakdos Cackler x 2, turn 3 6/6 trampler for 3. After having already dealt 6 damage, on turn 4 you're looking at 13 and one very unhealthy looking opponent. Of course, removal stops this plan, but even if only 2 of the cretins get through you're looking at an above curve turn 3 play.
However, most players are just going to go the path of reliability and play a 3 drop that's always decent.
Worldfire's ruling says the following:
"If your life total is greater than 1 when Worldfire resolves, the change in life total will count as life loss. Other effects that interact with life loss will interact with this effect accordingly."
Anyone consider this a slight flavor failure?